'West Wing' creator explores the birth of TV in Camarillo play

Who invented TV?

Eric Mello (right) plays David Sarnoff, the head of the Radio Corporation of America, in "The Farnsworth Invention." Co-starring in the show are (from left) Richard Abbott, Todd Tickner and William Carmichael.

Contributed photo

Aaron Sorkin's take on Philo T. Farnsworth's battle to create television in the early years of the 20th century will be staged through Aug. 26 at the Camarillo Skyway Playhouse, 330 Skyway Drive, Camarillo. Performances are at 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Tickets are $18 general, $13 seniors, military and students; and $10 children 12 and younger. Call 388-5716 or visit skywayplayhouse.org.

A world without television would be a world few today could imagine. But there was such a world, just as there was one without radio, and without motion pictures.

Thanks to Philo T. Farnsworth, a Utah farm boy with a flair for electronic and mechanical invention, TV arrived sooner than it might have, even though he didn't always get full credit for his crucial contributions.

The battle among a multitude of potential innovators at various U.S. research and business sites is a focus of Aaron Sorkin's play "The Farnsworth Invention," now on stage at Camarillo Skyway Playhouse. At 13, Farnsworth was the youngest to envision all-electronic television and his insights were phenomenal. Sorkin, who many TV fans will remember as creator-writer of "The West Wing" series, brings the same kind of quick-and-clever dialogue to the stage that he did to the tube. That's both a virtue, thanks to the riveting intensity it produces, and a bit of a drawback as technical information comes at an audience fast and furious, leaving some at opening night missing essential strains of the argument, while at least catching the funniest of the comeuppances delivered. Farnsworth's relentless drive and many-faceted mind can at times be as confusing as it is compelling.

Central figures in the cast do their utmost to deliver the information-laden lines crisply and persuasively. Best at communicating the fast-moving text is Patrick Beckstead in the title role. From the opening scene when as a bumptious student he asks his new science teacher if he can skip the basic course and the teacher says no, it's obvious something's in the air. The next day Farnsworth produces his "homework," a mass of papers that cover the entire course, and the teacher changes his mind.

From that moment on, Beckstead, as convincing as a grown up as a kid, fuels Farnsworth's fire though endless experimentation on crucial elements of TV transmission, working with only a few friends who are equally surprising innovators.

The major confrontation of the play, it turns out, comes from another young man, David Sarnoff, who emigrated with his mother and siblings from Europe to America in 1900, when he was 9. Sarnoff was a driving force in the expansion of radio, eventually heading Radio Corporation of America (RCA), and alert enough to recognize the possibilities of television as an even more world-changing communications force. Of course, it took quite a while before the technical problems of making television actually work were solved. And possibly, some shenanigans to latch on to Farnsworth's key work. The smooth Sarnoff is effectively played by Eric Mello, who gets to utter the words that define him in Sorkin's play, "The ends do justify the means … that's what means are for."

Sorkin's play has been criticized by some history buffs for its crucial courtroom scene in which Farnsworth loses the patent-right contest. It seems that he actually won, but that would have made a different kind of story. The explanation centers on the fact that there was more than one legal skirmish and that Farnsworth lost some even while ultimately winning and going on to invent many other patents in his areas of interest.

Director Elissa Anne Polansky effectively handles the cast of 23, many in multiple roles, with action taking place against a simple backdrop that includes a second-level area to accommodate a continuous flow of scenes. There are familiar faces in the cast along with welcome new ones, all obviously committed to a serious performance of the play, presented for the first time on a major county stage.

But the most striking element of the production comes at the opening when two large screens on either side of the stage come alive with unforgettable television moments, from grainy shots of Walter Cronkite announcing John F. Kennedy's death and the appropriately unearthly sight of an American walking on the moon to silly flash-by shots of Lucy and Desi, "All in the Family" and Richard Nixon gamely intoning "Sock it to me!"

Now that television and other means of mass communication have flooded the world the question no longer seems to be how are we going to communicate with the rest of humanity, but can we try to make what we send out worth the electronic trip?

"The Farnsworth Invention" may not be the most colorful drama onstage, but it is a timely reminder of what life was like before TV, and how much struggle went into making it a reality.